God loves you. I'm sure you've heard that before. Seen it on a church sign or may have had someone say it to you. It can be thought of as some sort of slogan or a catch phrase. Maybe as an advertisement, like the burger companies have, only this would be to try to appeal to the masses to get them in church. Maybe make people feel better about themselves. But what if it were true? What if, instead of a jingle or a 15 second commercial, there really was a truth behind the message of those three little words. Starting with the word God, supposing He exists, what about us would cause Him to love us? Love is a flippant word sometimes. People say it and it doesn't mean much. A throwaway word in human terms. But what if this God meant it when He said “I Love You”. What reason would he even have to do so. Is it because we are so awesome? Because we are so generous and caring towards other people? Because we give to charities and don't cheat on our taxes? Maybe we think of ourselves as good people, not hating others or fighting with them, trying to be at peace with everybody. But what about that time you did that one thing that you never do? But what about that one time that you thought about doing that thing that you never think about doing? Maybe we can think of times when we have or would have chosen the wrong thing, the thing that wouldn't be right to do. Maybe times when we did follow through with the deed or thought? The Bible says this is actually sin. Who is God? I don't have to answer to Him anyway! Well, according to the Bible, we do.
You see, the Bible tells us that in the beginning, God was there. He decided to create. His desire was to create humans in His image, so He created a perfect environment to live in with animals, plants, fruits and vegetables. He made man from the dust of the earth, the perfect earth. He gave man a woman to live with him and help him take care of the garden, paradise. They lived there with all of the animals without fear of them. Imagine petting a lion, feeding a squirrel or riding on a dinosaur. The Bible says that God walked in the garden with them and they had fellowship, a strange word in today's society to be sure. So let's try friendship. The kind of friendship where you know everything about the other person and they know everything about you. The only feeling being complete and total Love for one another. So there they were, everything perfect and yet somehow, something called out to them. Something forbidden. The one thing they could not have. Sometimes that is all that we want. Even though they had everything, even though we have everything. And so they gave in and ate of the forbidden fruit, off the one tree they were not to eat from. Greedy? That is how we are. We have all we could want and still want more. That one thing more, the one thing that will completely satisfy. Why did they give in? Why do we give in? He made them so He could love them and yet they wanted more than His love. He fashioned them with the freedom to choose. To choose Him and choose Life, or to choose that one thing more and choose, ultimately, death. And so He had to punish them. He punished them and the Serpent who led them into temptation. But first God promised a way out. A Hero would come and Rescue them. He would die in their place, so that they would live forever. In eternity, their souls would go on, in a new paradise to be enjoyed with complete perfection. We sing songs about this. We want to believe in a Love that will go on forever. Without knowing sometimes, we sing, we write about this Unending Love. This Love can be found in this Loving Creator. And so many years later, the Hero came and died in the place of everyone who has ever lived. His name is Jesus and He wants everyone to come and live with Him forever. Taking the wrath of God for the sins of many, so that the many, who had all sinned, could be forever with Him in this Unending Love Story.
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I wonder how many people really know how much Jesus loves them. Many believe that He died for sins, or even their sins. Many have faith to believe that He loves them when they do good things. Some believe that He loves only a certain, chosen few. Many feel that He only loves them when they do something for Him. The fact is that He loves us all regardless of what we do or don't do. His love is constant, unchanging, unwavering and unfailing. What we do with this information will determine how we journey through life. We can dismiss it and live life as if He does not exist at all. We can live our lives desperately trying to earn His love and approval. Or we can accept the fact that we can neither do anything to make Him love us more or love us less.
As for me, I have “been seized by the power of a Great Affection”. It is a “Love Affair” worth telling and retelling. A life that was clouded by shame and regrets, is now free and clear of the chains and weight of my own shame. The clouds and darkness became normal to me when I realized that I could not be good enough to earn His Love. His Love shattered through the dark and awoke all of my senses. I am alive because a Love greater than I had ever known, wrecked my life as I knew it. A Love that cost Him everything. A King stepped down from His throne to put Himself in our shoes, to walk this dusty soil. To taste, to feel, to hurt deeply and forever sympathize with us, His created beings. Tempted in every way that we are, cast down, beaten, broken, spit upon, crowned with thorns and crucified, unrecognizable. Still crying out forgiveness on a creation that continued to reject Him as He hung there “drowning in His own blood”. As the days passed, His followers, thought it was all over. They may have felt it was all a waste. The healing He had brought, the people who had left everything to follow Him. The lives that were changed for the better. Now what? As the reports came in that His tomb was empty, they wrestled with Hope. The Hope that it could be true, that He could have been raised from the dead. That all was not lost and that there was still a plan in place to make everything right again one day. The joyous hope that they and we can all still have that chance at an eternal existence and a perfect place to live.
So, as we can see, this is all according to some crazy plan that this Creator God and Savior cooked up together. So, we at this point have done nothing. Nothing to earn or deserve this Generous and Crazy Love. He gave everything, sacrificed it all just to be with us. Literally dying to be with us. The Maker of the Heavens, cares so deeply for us that He wants us to love Him back. We have all played the role of jaded lover. We have all loved or cared for someone else and yet it was not reciprocated. Yet, He in His Perfect Wisdom and Love, does not get jaded. He doesn't get angry at our lack of love for Him. He waits patiently, sometimes for a human to spend their whole lifetime up, before realizing that His Love was all that mattered. The porch light is on and He just waits. Some never come Home. Some give their affections to other things. Not everyone born will come to love Him back. Not everyone will find their way. Not everyone will be able to believe it as Truth. He does not force. He will not make us. He just sits and waits. What will you do? What will you do with this information? Will you believe? Or walk away in Doubt? Somehow, even in our doubts and fears, He still waits and does not take offense. He is greater than our doubts, and He is OK with them. He longs for us to come to faith, to come to believe, but He can wait for us as we wrestle with those things. He did for me and He can wait for you!
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To address my belief that He will not stop loving us, no matter what, I will say that with the right perspective, we will come to realize that we do good things because we are motivated by love for Him. The Bible specifically addresses the faith and works issue. But Faith is the key! We cannot obtain Faith strictly by our works and we cannot sit idly by and think that it is enough to have only Faith and no works. There is a balance, but let us not do anything without first being motivated by our love for Him. To say that we are doing right and good things, without love is inaccurate. It is also false to say you have works without first having Faith. The biggest part of our faith should be the belief that He loves us so much that it would not matter if we ever did anything for Him. But because of that belief, we love Him enough to begin to do good works. A heart motivated by love for a Creator Savior, will show that love through what is done by the individual.
So as I come to a close, Do you believe? Do you Really Believe that He Loves You? Not the good people you know, or the ones that go to church. Not the preacher or the priest, deacon or Sunday School teacher, but you. Despite what you may have done, all of the wrong decisions and all of the twists and turns that your life has taken as a result of bad choices. In spite of the shame and the guilt, things too unbearable to mention. No matter the hangups and hurts and fears that you have. Do you Believe? No matter the abuses you have taken or the abuses you have inflicted. The times when you thought of Him for a moment until it passed and you carried on again with what you were doing. No matter if you know all there is to know about Him, if you don't know about this Unrelenting, Unfailing and Unending Love and Forgiveness that He offers, you have missed it. You have missed out because you discarded the Gift of Love that He has offered to you. To the one who wants nothing to do with Him, He wants everything to do with you. He knows you inside and out, was there before you were formed, knows every decision you have ever made and yet He still loves you, still pursues you! He formed your heart, knows your thoughts and ways, and still Hopes above all else that you will run to Him. To the lifelong churchgoer, the clergymen, the Sunday School teacher; do you really know Him? Do you know of this Incredible and Indescribable Love that says you can stop striving now and enter into the rest that my Loving Arms provide? You can stop DOING because you're supposed to and because you think you ought to. Rest, just rest, my child. You are deeply loved, regardless. Be still and believe that I love you because I want to, not because you have pleased me and you've earned my Love. I have Loved you with My Cross, and I have Loved you because of the Joy that I have. It was My Pleasure to do so. To do all the work, so that you would not have to. Come, sit with Me, under the shadow of My Wings. I will Protect you, Comfort you and continue to Adore you. You are my Delight and I Treasure the Very Thought of you. You were in My Mind before time began and I have waited for so long to be with you. Here. Now. Rest in My Love. I will not let you go and I will never leave you. I Really Love You!
You see, the Bible tells us that in the beginning, God was there. He decided to create. His desire was to create humans in His image, so He created a perfect environment to live in with animals, plants, fruits and vegetables. He made man from the dust of the earth, the perfect earth. He gave man a woman to live with him and help him take care of the garden, paradise. They lived there with all of the animals without fear of them. Imagine petting a lion, feeding a squirrel or riding on a dinosaur. The Bible says that God walked in the garden with them and they had fellowship, a strange word in today's society to be sure. So let's try friendship. The kind of friendship where you know everything about the other person and they know everything about you. The only feeling being complete and total Love for one another. So there they were, everything perfect and yet somehow, something called out to them. Something forbidden. The one thing they could not have. Sometimes that is all that we want. Even though they had everything, even though we have everything. And so they gave in and ate of the forbidden fruit, off the one tree they were not to eat from. Greedy? That is how we are. We have all we could want and still want more. That one thing more, the one thing that will completely satisfy. Why did they give in? Why do we give in? He made them so He could love them and yet they wanted more than His love. He fashioned them with the freedom to choose. To choose Him and choose Life, or to choose that one thing more and choose, ultimately, death. And so He had to punish them. He punished them and the Serpent who led them into temptation. But first God promised a way out. A Hero would come and Rescue them. He would die in their place, so that they would live forever. In eternity, their souls would go on, in a new paradise to be enjoyed with complete perfection. We sing songs about this. We want to believe in a Love that will go on forever. Without knowing sometimes, we sing, we write about this Unending Love. This Love can be found in this Loving Creator. And so many years later, the Hero came and died in the place of everyone who has ever lived. His name is Jesus and He wants everyone to come and live with Him forever. Taking the wrath of God for the sins of many, so that the many, who had all sinned, could be forever with Him in this Unending Love Story.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I wonder how many people really know how much Jesus loves them. Many believe that He died for sins, or even their sins. Many have faith to believe that He loves them when they do good things. Some believe that He loves only a certain, chosen few. Many feel that He only loves them when they do something for Him. The fact is that He loves us all regardless of what we do or don't do. His love is constant, unchanging, unwavering and unfailing. What we do with this information will determine how we journey through life. We can dismiss it and live life as if He does not exist at all. We can live our lives desperately trying to earn His love and approval. Or we can accept the fact that we can neither do anything to make Him love us more or love us less.
As for me, I have “been seized by the power of a Great Affection”. It is a “Love Affair” worth telling and retelling. A life that was clouded by shame and regrets, is now free and clear of the chains and weight of my own shame. The clouds and darkness became normal to me when I realized that I could not be good enough to earn His Love. His Love shattered through the dark and awoke all of my senses. I am alive because a Love greater than I had ever known, wrecked my life as I knew it. A Love that cost Him everything. A King stepped down from His throne to put Himself in our shoes, to walk this dusty soil. To taste, to feel, to hurt deeply and forever sympathize with us, His created beings. Tempted in every way that we are, cast down, beaten, broken, spit upon, crowned with thorns and crucified, unrecognizable. Still crying out forgiveness on a creation that continued to reject Him as He hung there “drowning in His own blood”. As the days passed, His followers, thought it was all over. They may have felt it was all a waste. The healing He had brought, the people who had left everything to follow Him. The lives that were changed for the better. Now what? As the reports came in that His tomb was empty, they wrestled with Hope. The Hope that it could be true, that He could have been raised from the dead. That all was not lost and that there was still a plan in place to make everything right again one day. The joyous hope that they and we can all still have that chance at an eternal existence and a perfect place to live.
So, as we can see, this is all according to some crazy plan that this Creator God and Savior cooked up together. So, we at this point have done nothing. Nothing to earn or deserve this Generous and Crazy Love. He gave everything, sacrificed it all just to be with us. Literally dying to be with us. The Maker of the Heavens, cares so deeply for us that He wants us to love Him back. We have all played the role of jaded lover. We have all loved or cared for someone else and yet it was not reciprocated. Yet, He in His Perfect Wisdom and Love, does not get jaded. He doesn't get angry at our lack of love for Him. He waits patiently, sometimes for a human to spend their whole lifetime up, before realizing that His Love was all that mattered. The porch light is on and He just waits. Some never come Home. Some give their affections to other things. Not everyone born will come to love Him back. Not everyone will find their way. Not everyone will be able to believe it as Truth. He does not force. He will not make us. He just sits and waits. What will you do? What will you do with this information? Will you believe? Or walk away in Doubt? Somehow, even in our doubts and fears, He still waits and does not take offense. He is greater than our doubts, and He is OK with them. He longs for us to come to faith, to come to believe, but He can wait for us as we wrestle with those things. He did for me and He can wait for you!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To address my belief that He will not stop loving us, no matter what, I will say that with the right perspective, we will come to realize that we do good things because we are motivated by love for Him. The Bible specifically addresses the faith and works issue. But Faith is the key! We cannot obtain Faith strictly by our works and we cannot sit idly by and think that it is enough to have only Faith and no works. There is a balance, but let us not do anything without first being motivated by our love for Him. To say that we are doing right and good things, without love is inaccurate. It is also false to say you have works without first having Faith. The biggest part of our faith should be the belief that He loves us so much that it would not matter if we ever did anything for Him. But because of that belief, we love Him enough to begin to do good works. A heart motivated by love for a Creator Savior, will show that love through what is done by the individual.
So as I come to a close, Do you believe? Do you Really Believe that He Loves You? Not the good people you know, or the ones that go to church. Not the preacher or the priest, deacon or Sunday School teacher, but you. Despite what you may have done, all of the wrong decisions and all of the twists and turns that your life has taken as a result of bad choices. In spite of the shame and the guilt, things too unbearable to mention. No matter the hangups and hurts and fears that you have. Do you Believe? No matter the abuses you have taken or the abuses you have inflicted. The times when you thought of Him for a moment until it passed and you carried on again with what you were doing. No matter if you know all there is to know about Him, if you don't know about this Unrelenting, Unfailing and Unending Love and Forgiveness that He offers, you have missed it. You have missed out because you discarded the Gift of Love that He has offered to you. To the one who wants nothing to do with Him, He wants everything to do with you. He knows you inside and out, was there before you were formed, knows every decision you have ever made and yet He still loves you, still pursues you! He formed your heart, knows your thoughts and ways, and still Hopes above all else that you will run to Him. To the lifelong churchgoer, the clergymen, the Sunday School teacher; do you really know Him? Do you know of this Incredible and Indescribable Love that says you can stop striving now and enter into the rest that my Loving Arms provide? You can stop DOING because you're supposed to and because you think you ought to. Rest, just rest, my child. You are deeply loved, regardless. Be still and believe that I love you because I want to, not because you have pleased me and you've earned my Love. I have Loved you with My Cross, and I have Loved you because of the Joy that I have. It was My Pleasure to do so. To do all the work, so that you would not have to. Come, sit with Me, under the shadow of My Wings. I will Protect you, Comfort you and continue to Adore you. You are my Delight and I Treasure the Very Thought of you. You were in My Mind before time began and I have waited for so long to be with you. Here. Now. Rest in My Love. I will not let you go and I will never leave you. I Really Love You!
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